Rich Hofmann: Playing fast with football rules could slow down Eagles

February 17, 2014|By Rich Hofmann, Philadelphia Daily News (MCT)

This would normally pass as a nothing kind of February story as far as the NFL is concerned. But seeing as how so much of current NFL offensive strategy was birthed in college, and seeing as how Eagles coach Chip Kelly is responsible for more than his share of the birthing, it is worth a mention.

That is, the proposal to slow down college football.

Under current rules, if an offensive team does not substitute, it can snap the ball as soon as the referee makes it ready for play. Under the proposal from the NCAA Football Rules Committee, the offensive team would not be able to snap the ball until the 40-second clock had reached 29 seconds. In the last two minutes of each half, there would be no such restriction. The penalty for a too-quick snap would be five yards for an Orwellian "delay of game" penalty.

Bad is good.

War is peace.

Freedom is slavery.

Too-quick is a delay of game.

With the change, defenses would be guaranteed 10 seconds to make a substitution, even if the offense does not change personnel. The way the rules currently stand, defenses only get a guaranteed chance to substitute if the offense subs first.

Is it the end of the world if the rule change is implemented? No. Does it mean the NFL will follow? Not necessarily. But anything that begins to tinker with the pace of the game begins to tinker with Chip Kelly.

Because, yes, the Eagles had the fastest-paced offense in the NFL last year, and for many years.

They only ran 1,054 plays, so the Eagles' pace last season ended up being an underdiscussed phenomenon. But when you compare the number of plays to the Eagles' time of possession — a low, low 26 minutes, 24 seconds per game — the truth comes out in the long division.

I started ciphering and came up with the notion that the Eagles were the fastest team in the NFL last season. Then I found out that the expert cipherers at footballoutsiders.com have done the calculations back to 1997 — and, by their numbers, the Eagles had the fastest-paced offense in all of those years of NFL play, one play every 23.38 seconds.

Was anybody before 1997 faster-paced? Maybe one of those Bills teams of the '80s and '90s, or one of the Bengals teams from before that — but the point is, there have not been many, if any. In 2013, the Eagles were more than four seconds per play faster than the league average — and, do not forget, even using three quarterbacks during the season, they averaged 6.34 yards per play, which also was the best in the league.

Fastest and most productive is a pretty good way to go through life, and the pace has something to do with the productivity, and now the NCAA incubator for all of this stuff is thinking about putting on the brakes.

"This rules change is being made to enhance student-athlete safety by guaranteeing a small window for both teams to substitute," said Troy Calhoun, the coach at Air Force and the head of the rules committee, in a statement. "As the average number of plays per game has increased, this issue has been discussed with greater frequency by the committee in recent years and we felt like it was time to act in the interests of protecting our student-athletes."

There was no data presented to back up the safety notion. Anyway, the NCAA statement also said:

"Research indicated that teams with fast-paced, no-huddle offenses rarely snap the ball with 30 seconds or more on the play clock. This rules proposal also aligns with a request from the Committee on Competitive Safeguards and Medical Aspects of Sports that sport rules committees review substitution rules in regards to player safety."

Again, this is the NCAA and not the NFL. Because college football decides one thing does not mean the NFL will follow. But this is the concern, from those two parts of the statement just quoted:

… the interests of protecting our student-athletes.

And:

… in regards to player safety.

In case you haven't been paying attention, the NFL is still trying to settle a gigantic lawsuit with its players over the question of concussions and player safety. The league has changed playing rules, changed practice rules, and gone out of its way to attempt to demonstrate, in big ways and small, that player safety is the league's foremost concern.

Given that climate, and with the threat of litigation ever-present, exactly how long will the NFL do nothing if the NCAA makes a player-safety rules change?

The answer is unknown right now. But when your team is the fastest-paced team in the NFL, it is an answer that matters.